


Your Place

by happilyinsane13



Series: "I defy you stars" [4]
Category: Captain America, Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post Angels Take Manhattan, Post PS to Brian Pond, Steve Feels, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-13
Updated: 2012-10-13
Packaged: 2017-11-16 04:59:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/535780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happilyinsane13/pseuds/happilyinsane13
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>River needs confirmations of her place in the certain lives of others after Anthony gives Brian the letter. Steve reaffirms his place in hers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Place

**Author's Note:**

> If you have not watched Angels Take Manhattan and THIS -->http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWU6XL9xI4k
> 
> You won't get it. Enjoy and please comment!

Steve was smearing lines of charcoal onto paper when he felt the buzz of time and electricity behind him. Knowing who it was he did his best to calmly put his artwork down and say,

“What is it this time, Professor Song?”

“You say that as if I only come to you with problems.” She quipped, coming up behind him and kissing his cheek.

Steve tried to beat down the heat that flared across his face. He was unsuccessful and he coughed before he replied,

“I don’t mind talking about your problems, in fact I prefer it over your frequent problems with aliens,” He paused as she smirked at him. “But you’ve been coming to me an awful lot lately. What about your husband?”

That’s what Steve called the Doctor now… just her “husband”. Ever since he had been informed about the Library he had held a certain grudge against him. 

“It seems he’s recalling me less and less these days. I rarely see my Doctor anymore.” River said sadly. 

Another stone fell into Steve’s stomach and his grudge against the Doctor grew a bit more. 

“Plus, to be honest, it’s best not to let him see the damage.”  
Make that a lot more. 

Steve pulled out a stool from under the table and she sank into it. She was beside him now and, not for the first time, she looked forlorn. His art studio was mostly empty of paintings now, with only the one he was working on flipped over in front of him. It was close to midnight and the sounds of car horns and sirens were loud and clear from inside the room. He didn’t need to turn his lights on because of the street lamps, neon lights, and the very dim moon provided enough through his wide windows.

“Well, as you know, my parents adopted a boy, my little brother Anthony,” River began, twisting her hands together anxiously.

Steve nodded encouragingly.

“And?”

“Well in the present day, this day I mean, Anthony went to give a letter written by dad to our grandfather,”

“And?”

“You know, to explain the situation and what happened with the angels and all that, tell them about their family…”

“Alright…”

“The letter… the letter doesn’t mention me.”

There was a heavy silence between them. It was filled with a thick sense of shame and agony, almost like miasma. River, the woman who was usually so strong and optimistic, looked so lost and hurt that Steve could not help but be mad on her behalf. Instead of yelling and blasting profanities like a deep part of him wanted to (deep, so very _deep_ where all his love for her lay under _dirt_ ) he leaned over and embraced her.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered in her ear, taking the moment to bury his face into her thick curls. “River, your dad he… He must have had a reason.”

“That’s the thing,” she murmured and he thought (he must have imagined it) that her voice cracked. A weakness… “I know there must have been, but I’m still so hurt and angry… and jealous. I love Anthony and he felt as guilty as hell about the whole thing but he… but he…”

“Got to be the child they watched grow up,” Steve said. “The one they raised, the one they connected with, went to all his birthday parties and school plays, saw him fall in love and get his heart broken…”

“Stop,” she pleaded, grasping his broad shoulders tightly and oh how he wished it was out of longing and not support. “They had all that with me too!”

“It’s not the same,” Steve went on, pushing her with his words yet pulling her closer. “You were their best friend. A friend is never the same as a child.”

River wanted to scream, wanted to yell at the top of her lungs, “But I’m their real child! Mother gave birth to _me_! I AM Melody Pond and damn it I deserve just as much, if not more, than Anthony!” But, River knew that _River Song_ did not throw herself to the ground and cry. She had plenty of that to come. A time where she could find the Doctor, her Doctor, and scream her bloody head off until she cried and he held her fast, promising her comfort and adventures.

Until then she had Steve Rogers, Captain America, her American Boy. The man who somehow managed to comfort her when she needed someone. No opposite timelines, no complications, just a good man in the exact same place where she had last left him. So she buried her face into his shoulder and allowed herself to cry and ask,

“Why? Why, why, _why_?”

He pulled away after a few minutes where her eyes shined and what he wanted to do was kiss her tear tracks away. Instead he held her mature face in his hands and used his calloused, black stained thumbs. A few streaks ran on her face and now his thumbs were wet, but neither cared.  
“How about you ask him?”

River blinked.

“The timelines-“

“After he writes it.”

“Too much risk.”

“Then ask him differently.”

River left in a burst of electricity. Steve stared at the cracking, fizzling spot where’d she been and then turned to flip over his drawing. Under the coal curly hair and the lined face he rubbed her tears onto the paper.

 

River was on their front doorstep. It was 1967 and Anthony would be twenty years old by now. This meant he was out of the house, giving her space, giving her room to ask what she needed to ask.

So she knocked on the front door. A minute or two later Rory answered, like she knew he would, and he stood there stunned. He should be. If her estimations were correct, she hadn’t visited since Anthony was fifteen. It was merely a few days ago for her. Years for them.

“River… oh my goodness… we thought… we thought…”

He took a step forward but before he could do anything she took a step back.

“Dad, I have to ask you…”

“What? River, what are you-“

“Do you love me?” she asked, her words coming out all garbled, messy and heartbroken. She really wanted to avoid that.

Rory didn’t speak and River cast her eyes to the cement. As she made her way to step away and never come back she was enveloped in two skinny but strong arms. A healer’s arms. A _father’s_ arms.

“Don’t you ever ask me that again.”

And River cried again and held her dad for all he was worth. She promised she wouldn’t miss another birthday or holiday. She promised to write and be good and tell the Doctor to get a bloody hair cut and try to be _happy_.

Her father must have had his reasons, and she found she didn’t need to know them. Not right now.

 

Tony entered the room a good three minutes after the woman had left, holding a plastic bag in his hand.

“Should have smelled the Chinese from the hallway,” Steve remarked, still staring at the drawing in front of him.

Tony walked forward and plopped the take-out on the table and then quickly sat in the space River had vacated.

“You know Old Man, I hate to say it, not really, but you’ve been friend-zoned,” Tony drawled. “And I mean permanently.”

Steve snorted.

“I don’t get the reference.”

“You know what I mean. Can’t get the dame cause not only is she married but she spills her guts out to you. A woman only tells her husband so much but you’re her close friend, she tells you everything, comes to you for advice. If that’s not friend-zoned than I might have actually had a shot with Cameron Francisco in the 11th grade. Judging by the frequency she told me about her sex life with Johnny Sampson, I doubt it.”

Steve wrinkled his nose but said nothing. In the proceeding silence Tony worked to undo the damn little plastic knot in order to free the Chinese he had so painstakingly ordered. He had done it all out of the kindness of his heart too! (Well, okay, Pepper had convinced him to get it and share it with Steve but that hardly mattered).

“Are you hiding the rest of your portraits?” Tony asked as he finally just ripped the bag open, spilling wrapped fortune cookies onto the table.

Steve inclined his head to a closet in the right corner of the room.

“Just like your feelings, huh?”

Steve just grabbed some wanton soup absentmindedly, his other hand still fingering his drawing.


End file.
